The deal marks one of the first cross-border transactions between two fintech startups in Southeast Asia who are also graduates of the Y Combinator accelerator programme.

It follows a recent $53 million funding rounding in PayFazz, which currently operates the largest agent-driven banking network in Indonesia with more than 250,000 registered agents.

Hendra Kwik, group CEO of Fazz Financial Group, says: “Leveraging PayFazz's vast local Indonesia network and Xfers’ robust payments infrastructure in the region, it was a natural next step for both firms to band together and work towards a common goal. With the newly-formed FFG group, our team will be broadening the combined capabilities to accelerate inclusion through financial services in Southeast Asia.”

Under the agreement, Xfers will serve as the designated business-to-business (B2B) and South East Asian regional arm of FFG - focussed on connecting external merchants to the payment infrastructure and user network amassed by FFG as a group.

PayFazz will lean on Xfer's payment infrastructure to deepen its agent network across Indonesia, where the latter firm currently connects businesses to a range of payment methods that includes bank transfer, e-wallet and, more reently, offline channels such as agent banking networks and convenience stores.

Since 2020, Xfers has been building up its position to enable agent banking networks to facilitate digital payments. Through PayFazz and other agent banking networks as its clients, Xfers has amassed access to over 10 million underbanked consumers in Indonesia.